Re: [CAD_CAM_EDM_DRO] CNC grinding & wheel dressing

Hear Hear!
I agree with you 100%, Jon.
In our mad rush to be totally CNC we are often overlooking other really good
options.
Pantographs are great tools.
You can do a helluva lot with them, and they are often way faster than CNC
when you factor in CAD design and programming time.
They are also super versatile.
I still grind a lot of form cutters on a little pantograph I made eons ago.
I haven't found a better way to make carbide formcutters than to use a
pantograph with a dental drill and diamond points.
For home shop use, I think they're still worthwhile to have around even if
you are fully CNC equipped.
Cheers

Marcus
-----Original Message-----
From: Jon Anderson <janders@...>
To: CAD_CAM_EDM_DRO@yahoogroups.com <CAD_CAM_EDM_DRO@yahoogroups.com>
Date: Wednesday, March 14, 2001 8:53 PM
Subject: Re: [CAD_CAM_EDM_DRO] CNC grinding & wheel dressing

>Ron,
>
>For a real world approach, consider a pantograph setup. If you scale up
>the profile 10x, this would be very machinable on a CNC mill. He would
>need to be able to leave the pantograph on the grinder, or have
>something rigged where it could be attached quickly and repeatably.
>Pantographs don't get no respect anymore. But a couple jobs back I did
>some work on a Deckel, making a prototype mold for a dental product.
>I did my templates 10x, and machined features into the mold that left
>energy directors in the molded part for ultrasonic welding. The features
>were too small to be seen clearly with the naked eye, but under a
>toolmaker's scope, you could hardly measure the deviation from print.
>
>Jon